As a little girl, my mother always told me, "As a Black woman, you have to work twice as hard, to get half as far." Reading "Literacy and the Black Women" by Sharon M. Darling is an echo of what my mother has told me. Black women in the American society are treated as the lowest of the low. She heads the group of everything negative in our society, such as illiteracy, poverty, and unemployment. In this essay, the question is raised, "Did the Black woman not exist when the education of women was taking place?" and the answer is "physically, she did not." Throughout history, she is passed by and overlooked. The sad part is, no one ever stopped to recognize the power and infinite beauty that the Black woman holds. Through everything we have endured, us women are still able to stand strong and power through, much better than anyone else.
So back to my original question. What does being a Black woman make you? Responsible for everyone's problems but your own? Another negative statistic? In my opinion, I believe that being a Black woman makes you emotionally and mentally strong so that you can lovingly guide and nurture the Black race, with little recognition or praise. As Mary McLeod Bethune said, "The true worth of a race must be measured by the character of its womanhood," and as Black women, we must learn to proudly carry and improve our race forward in this backwards society.
"Only a Black woman can say 'when and where I enter, in the quiet, undisputed dignity of my womanhood, without violence and without suing or special patronage, then and there the whole race enters with me.'"- Anna Julia Cooper
- Brianna Holmes
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ReplyDeleteI think that you stated in your blog a factual representation of the black woman. She is often overlooked as not being involved during the introduction of education and equality for women. Usually white women are thiis distinction for all things that have to do with the introduction to education for women. I think that because that we an overlooked group that it does make us stronger and that we are empowered by the fact they we receive no or less privileges than others in the world.
ReplyDeleteKendra Robinson